Remote ordering systems have been proposed for providing homeowners and business-persons the ability to order staple items from one or more merchants without the need to travel to a merchant location. However, such prior art systems have failed to provide the user with adequate information necessary for tracking or editing orders made or lists compiled.
Typically, prior art remote ordering systems provide some form of optical or magnetic scanner associated with a remote interface for reading coded product identification information found on product packaging. Most such systems, such as U.S. Pat. No. 4,654,482 (DeAngelis), provide an indication that a product code has been scanned, either via an audible tone or a visual indicator such as an LED. However, none of the prior art systems describes how to produce a user-interpretable description of the products placed in a list of items based on the scanned codes such as manufacturer and product name, product size, and product cost while such list is being constructed. For example, user-readable product descriptions are only provided in DeAngelis once an order list has been completed and conveyed to a merchant's order receiving apparatus, and only while connected to a merchant's order receiving apparatus.